At last, all of my classes were over.

It was, then, possibly somewhat odd that I found myself back in the academy. Presently, I was parked in front of an empty bulletin board outside the door of Introduction to Dungeon Delving, with most of my classmates packed into the too-tight hallway as well. While I’d have normally been taking advantage of my newly free schedule to recharge and be as unashamedly lazy as possible, today was slightly different.

“I find that I am nervous,” Alara admitted, her voice for once soft enough to get lost amongst the surrounding hushed chatter. “I wish to face my results head on, but I must stand here waiting instead.”

Emin opened his mouth, likely to make some sort of comforting remark, but it was at that moment that a soft click sounded out. Those of us with strong enough Perception to hear it all pivoted to the newly unlocked classroom door. A moment later, our instructor walked out, a host of papers in hand.

“A good showing.” Her appearance quieted the hallway. “As a reminder, you may take the second half of the course if you scored above a 60. I will look forward to it, and I hope you all will too.”

With how much nervous energy was filling the space around us, I was happy she hadn’t opted for a long speech. Instead, she posted the papers one by one, parted the crowd like the red sea, and then left to go about her business.

At once, the entire class swarmed the board. The three of us hadn’t arrived quite early enough to get an ideal spot, so it would be a moment before we could-

“I will see it now,” Alara stated. A hand that could probably crush skulls clamped down on the shoulder of someone in front of Alara, and within moments, they were now behind her.

Both Emin and I shot the guy an apologetic look as he grumbled at the rough treatment, but it didn’t stop us from tailing Alara and using her like a slipstream. In seconds, we grew close enough to read what was posted.

Introduction to Dungeon Delving Class Rankings

A long list of names trailed down the paper, along with each person’s exact test score. That kind of lack of privacy made me instinctively nervous, but I’d known from the get-go that it would be happening.

I scanned from the top of the list down, stopping before I found mine to note the two names that stuck out to me.

#1 Emin - 99

…

#4 Verin’Sylus - 96

Seeming to see the same thing I had, Alara whooped and clapped Emin on the back. “Hah! Number one! As to be expected from you, dark plant man! You will doubtless lead us to victory next semester!” From the pride in her voice, one could have been forgiven for thinking that she had been the one to rank first instead of Emin.

If she knows that he’s number one, I guess she does know his actual name. Sometimes I really wasn’t sure with her.

For his part, “dark plant man” furiously rubbed at the back of his head, not seeming to know what to do with the compliment. “I’m, uh- I’m glad to have your trust. And thank you. A shame about that missing point though. Do you think perhaps it might have been an error? I may have to track the instructor down at some point and-”

I ignored Emin being Emin and continued down the list, happy, if somewhat surprised, that I didn’t have long to go.

#12 Tess’Astorius - 91

“PPG! You did not tell me you were also a genius! I will need to update your moniker now to GPG!” Much like Emin, I, too, received a proprietary back-crushing clap. Honestly though, I was probably more shocked than she was.

Kind of figured that people who’d grown up here would have a natural advantage with this nonsense. Once in a while, things would come up that were considered common knowledge that I had no way of following. On top of that, I imagined people with adventurer parents would have been teaching them the course material practically since birth.

I would have liked to say that it was due to my amazing work ethic and studying skills — which, in all fairness, going through college and grad school probably did give me a massive leg up in this sort of stuff — but in truth, it was probably my skills and stats. Anything that came to memorization was a cinch with God’s Mind, and for anything that wasn’t sheer regurgitation, my somewhat abnormally high Intelligence seemed to pull through. Connections and jumps in logic I wasn’t entirely confident I’d have made back on Earth now came as second nature.

In that light, it was almost kind of shameful that Emin had outdone me considering how much my magic brain was cheating for me. The guy must have really been smart in a way past what a simple number could define.

Verin too, I reminded myself. I would have to congratulate her once I saw her. I imagined she was here somewhere in the crowd, but it was hard to say.

Suds will probably be pretty happy with this too, won’t he? 12th wasn’t a bad look for the new kid.

With Emin, Verin, and me accounted for, all that remained was Alara. I continued down the list in an effort to find her.

And continued down.

And down.

The rankings continued on a separate sheet of paper, and I scanned that one too.

…

#53 Gamin’Larin - 71

…

#62 Piler - 66

As I grew closer and closer to the cutoff to pass the class, I felt myself start to sweat a little. Alara couldn’t have actually failed, could she have? Sure she had some test troubles, but she was perfectly fine to come into the dungeon with us.

A few more lines. A few more lines after that. As our silence drew on, I could feel the tension rolling off of Alara to my side.

And then finally.

#73 Alara’Valis - 61

“Alara! There!” It was my turn to congratulate her, and I did so unreservedly, encasing the giant woman in a hug. Somehow I was more excited to see her score than I was for my own, despite the 30 point difference. “We’re going to go dungeon delving next semester!”

No longer remembering to modulate her voice, Alara boomed out a laugh that filled the entire hallway. “Of course we are! Another mighty foe that I have vanquished!” She shined with a confidence I hadn’t seen even when she’d won scores of duels against her peers. “But enough about me! You took on one of the role tests, did you not? Where are you?”

That was right. I’d done that whole Perception subtest afterwards. I’d ended up a little unhappy with it, truth be told, as I’d run out of time before collecting everything. I was confident I’d still gotten a pretty good score, but hopefully the time crunch hadn’t dinged me too much.

Scanning the remainder of the papers, I found my quarry.

Perception-Based Rankings

Note - This test is scored out of a theoretical possible 5000 points.

For a general sense of what your score maps to, the following benchmarks may be useful. All benchmarks assume a level 15 person unless stated otherwise.

Average person, 10 Perception - 100 points

Average person, 15 Perception - 190 points

Scout (Common variant) - 480 points

Scout (Uncommon variant) - 550 points

Scout (Rare variant) - 720 points

Treasure Seeker (Rare variant) - 1510 points (though often “dies” to traps)

Professional dungeon-delving Scout (Rare variant, level 20) - 1980 points

Professional dungeon-delving Treasure Seeker (Rare variant, level 20) - 2480 points

Scout/Seeker for a top ranking adventuring party (Epic variant, level 25) - 4010 points

Highest recorded score - 4620 points

Huh. I’d mostly taken the test to prove to potential party-mates that I was passable at the Perception side of things. It’d be nice to get a more objective sense of where I actually ranked against the pros, though.

I had a lot of legs up with my Perception and a few vision tricks, so I was hoping for a solid showing. On the flip side, considering my class was a combat class and every class skill for a Scout would presumably be about finding things, I doubted I’d get too high a score. Plus, actual people with scout-like classes would have their detection skills trained much higher than mine too.

I looked down to the rankings, only to freeze on reading them.

That’s… that’s not right, is it?

I checked some of the other lines to see if something was wrong, but they all looked pretty normal.

#2 Shilis’Bren - 780 points

#3 Piler - 670points

Perfectly good scores, placing the students at around a Rare scout-type class’s score, even before finishing the class. I was sure whoever they were, they’d do their teams well.

I went one line up, frowning at the text.

#1 Tess’Astorius - 2680 points

Alara turned to the paper, then to me, repeating this motion a few times. “I am returning your acronym to PPG,” was her only comment.

For his part, Emin looked at me like some sort of alien. I couldn’t even fault him considering I technically kind of was.

“I… maybe… did a little better than I thought?” The explanation sounded lame even to my ears.

How is that so impossibly high, though? I knew I was a lot more perceptive than the average person, but we weren’t talking about the average person anymore. I ran a quick mental audit on what I had going for me.

All right. My Perception currently sits at 29. High, but not ground-breaking if Scouts and Treasure Seekers are getting Perception from their class.

If not my Perception, then it had to be my skills? First I mentally tallied up how many things I’d caught just through use of Arcane Vision. Some spaces behind the waterfalls. An area of impure water. Just about, well, everything underground.

Okay. So maybe that skill’s a bit stronger than I’ve been thinking. Still, a full-on Treasure Seeker would probably find a lot of that stuff too, wouldn’t they? Plus, everyone’s level of Detect Secret would probably be a lot higher than mine.

Actually, is that true? If I recalled, it wasn’t possible to get the skill until you had 25 Perception, which meant it wasn’t something people were training up since childhood. On top of that, I had some boons and buffs working for me.

From Illuminated Sight, all of my detection skills were treated as if they were 10 levels higher. And then after that, there was a somewhat vague descriptor in God’s Eye.

Increases the effects and leveling speeds of detection-based skills.

On top of that, Arcane Vision came with a near-identical effect of its own when it was active, minus the leveling speed part.

I wasn’t sure if they were granting me a few extra levels or some kind of multiplier. Taken all together, though, I supposed Detect Secret was conservatively at least level 30 by now.

Oh. Plus, uh, seeing past all the illusions. Can’t forget about that one.

“You know, I think I just realized I might be more perceptive than I thought.” In fact, maybe I should have been hiding that? I was starting to realize it was a little more abnormal than I’d understood. “Um. That’s it, though, right? Let’s make way for everyone else.” I pulled them away from the board with me, suddenly feeling self-conscious.

We — and by we, I mostly meant Alara again — pushed through the crowd, extricating ourselves from the curious and the anxious students until we’d left the hallway completely. Once it was a bit less noisy, I decided to check in on everyone’s plans.

“Are you two busy? Should we do something to celebrate the official end of the semester, or how’s everyone feeling?” With the rankings getting posted, we were all well and truly done.

“I will celebrate!” Alara shouted. In a much more subdued tone, she amended herself. “But tomorrow. I told my uncle I would inform him of my results promptly.”

Well, fair enough. Probably wasn’t wise to blow off promises to a chamber head, especially when he was one of the fighting-specific ones.

“I, uh, will wait till tomorrow then too. I’ve been spending more time than usual on social things recently, so I’d planned to use the day to get some research done.”

A bit of a let down, but ultimately, waiting one day wouldn’t make too much of a difference to me. We reached the door to the outside, and right as we were about to say our goodbyes and head our separate ways, a notification hit me.

On reading it, I froze mid step. Noticing my strange pause, the other two turned back to face me.

“That’s a notification face! What did you get? A Legendary skill that bards will tell tales of? Mythic, even?” She eyed me expectantly, and though Emin was polite enough to pry, it was clear that he was curious too.

Still, the notification had caught me even more unprepared than my test scores had.

Age has increased to 27!

“I, uh. My age just increased.” I guess the system did things pretty exactly over here instead of ticking it up at midnight. I ran the math of how long I’d been here and when I’d arrived finding that, yeah, it checked out. Another year alive.

Alara slammed a hand down onto my shoulder, holding it with an uncharacteristically vice-like grip. “PPG. That would make today your birthday, would it not?”

I guessed so. Or at least sort of. Not like the calendar here was the standard Gregorian I was used to. “Yes?”

Alara looked to me. Then she looked to Emin.

She nodded.

Then, in one effortless motion, she slid her hand from my shoulder to my side and scooped me up off the ground. I found myself dangling from her shoulder like a piece of lumber a moment later.

I squawked out a protest and heard Emin start to do so on my behalf, but in an instant, his protests became more personal as she repeated the process with him. The only saving grace was that he’d been moved to her other shoulder instead of getting stacked atop me.

What the hell just happened?

“Alara! What are you doing?” If people had actually been around to see this, I’d have been mortified.

It was right about then that she turned around and started jogging back through the hallways.

“I have misremembered!” Somehow her lungs still had enough air to shout despite her jogging while carrying the two of us. “I have just recalled that my uncle told me to inform him of my scores tomorrow. I have also misremembered dark plant man’s plans! I am now recalling that he will be working on his research tomorrow, is that not correct, DPM?”

Emin, having seemingly gone mute from having been swept off the ground, found his tongue once more. “What? That’s- That’s not how memories work. I-” He lurched upwards as Alara abruptly shifted him on her shoulder, compressing his stomach a bit and forcing out a wheeze. “I- Oh. Oh yes. Today I was hoping to get some celebration in so I could focus on my work tomorrow. I believe that’s what I said.”

Despite the position I found myself in, I started laughing, the sound of it echoing through the hallways of the academic building as Alara jogged on. I just couldn’t help it.

That was maybe some of the worst lying I’ve ever heard. If either of them had some sort of Deception skill, I was confident it would have just unleveled.

That’s sweet though. I wouldn’t have forced either of them to do something with me for my birthday if they were busy. It was just a day, after all. It was an undeniably good feeling to see them willing to move things aside to spend the time with me.

Didn’t really explain why I was being lugged around like this though.

“Alara, that’s very sweet and all, but do you think we could talk about this while I was on the grou-”

With a sudden flash of horror, I realized I recognized the hallway we were in. One more turn and we’ll be back to-

The turn in question happened.

A full hallway of our classmates turned to face us.

This is so embarrassing! I considered Jet Stepping or even summoning up my plate armor to make Alara come crashing down, but at this point, that would just cause more of a commotion.

“I will ask you two to hang tightly, please!” Saying no more in explanation, Alara then launched herself upwards, not bothering to put either of us down beforehand. Fueled by the power of her class, our mass lessened enough that the jump was trivial to her.

“Hah! I was correct!” She seemed to have found something, but what it was, I couldn’t say. The angle she had me at kept me from following her line of sight.

Unfortunately, it didn’t look like I’d be wondering for long, as when she touched the ground once more, she took off again immediately. This time her jump was forward, narrowly carrying her over the heads of our classmates, all of whom were now watching us.

Breaks. Breaks! I briefly wondered if she’d stop if I very gently stabbed her — a Cal-like thought if I’d ever had one — but judged that it was too late by now. The students who were standing at her soon-to-be landing site all scurried out of the way lest they be crushed beneath the weight of all three of us.

Angled as I was, I had to crane my neck to even catch a glimpse of what she’d shot off to. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a streak of long white hair, and I nearly short circuited.

Alara! Alara, no!

Alara landed, thankfully using her powers to do so lightly and without damaging the flooring, and immediately boomed out for all to hear. “Lady Verin! Hi again! You would count yourself as a friend of PPG’s, correct?”

I groaned, audible for all to hear. Somehow the situation had gotten even more embarrassing. We’d officially surpassed the level of embarrassment I’d thought I would ever feel after getting out of high school. Twenty-six- (scratch that, twenty-seven-) year-olds weren’t supposed to have to deal with this type of stuff.

“Lady Valis. Despite the questionable circumstances, I wish to express my gratitude for your usage of my actual name. If by ‘PPG,’ you are referring to the Lady Astorius, then yes. I view our relationship fondly and would count her as a friend. Furthermore, I will add that I enjoyed our collective time eating dinner together.”

Aw. Love you too, pal.

“Good! Then as you have asked me not to touch you, I must ask for your permission to abduct you!” Her words once again carried much farther than needed, and I could hear some muttering taking place from everyone else.

I can’t even tell which part sounded worse. The part where she asks to abduct a high noble, or the out-of-context part where she lets everyone know Verin had to ask Alara not to touch her.

“I decline. I do feel obliged, however, to inform you that one does not usually ask for permission in an abduction. Additionally, I would like to point out that you seem to be lacking in both hands and shoulders currently. Past that, I would like to know for what reason you are attempting to take me. I would ask if you had reconsidered your earlier aversion to being drawn, but from the circumstances, I would hazard a guess this is something entirely separate.”

On being told she lacked any more hands, Alara tilted her head from side to side, seeming to take the two of us in for the first time. “Huh. You make a good point, Lady Verin! As for the reason, we have just discovered that it is PPG’s birthday today, and I happened to remember that you will be joining us to celebrate!”

There was a pause, and I would have paid to be turned around right about then to see everyone’s expressions. Right as I was about to apologize and be a bit more forceful about getting myself down, however, Verin chimed in again.

“Ah. It would seem you have a good memory then, Lady Valis.” The tone of her voice shifted as she seemed to address someone else, likely one of the many nobles that tended to hang around her. “I find that I have plans to attend to. When you return to the Noble District, please inform my household that I will be engaged for an unknown period.”

With that, Verin walked past Alara, finally coming firmly into my line of sight. “I am afraid it would be seen as improper were I to be carried in such a manner, however, and as such, I must insist on walking.” Her lips curled upwards almost imperceptibly as she spoke, and she turned to face me directly where the upper half of my body hung suspended off the ground.

“If in their haste, neither of these two have remembered to say it, please let me be the first to say: Happy Birthday, Lady Astorius.”